Guilt
by Hellsleprechaun
Summary: What did Silas say to Stefan on the night of the dance? Silas sees Stefan's guilt over the pain he has caused his brother and tries to exploit it, leading to Stefan thinking about how he's hurt Damon in the past and how he might be hurting him now.


**I do not own the vampire diaries, it belongs to L.J Smith and the CW.**

**This was requested by enchanted hybrid, who wondered what Damon! Silas said to Stefan in 4x19.**

Stefan stood outside Mystic Falls high school at the very edge of the woods, trying to watch out for Silas, who could take on the appearance of anybody. He recognised that his watching for somebody who could look like anyone was arbitrary because if Silas did appear he would have no way on knowing it was him until it was too late. Still, he would rather be out here with something, even something hopeless, to focus on, than inside with Elena.

He had told Damon that he intended to move on, that he would help to get the cure for Elena, but then he was leaving her and Mystic Falls behind him. As it turned out, that was easier said than done, both getting Elena the cure and moving on from her. He had tried to reawaken her humanity, to remind her of the times they shared, when she loved him and when he was actually happy to be in love with her. It seemed that she was completely unaffected by him and the memories of being together- he wished he could say the same about himself.

He heard footsteps and his intense gaze flickered up suspiciously to land on a small, skinny, intimidated looking boy in his history class. He sighed in exasperation at himself as the poor guy whose name he forgot- Jeffrey? Joffrey? James? Gerald?- scurried away hurriedly.

_Nice work, Stefan, now you're terrorising innocent teenagers. _He sarcastically commended himself, fighting the temptation to call an apology after the boy.

This had not been a good night, not only had he managed to let Elena affect him, as he had sworn he would not, but he had also seen Damon's face after their dance together and he could now feel a guilty sick sensation building in his gut.

"Hey," Damon appeared beside him, snapping him out of his thoughts.

"Hey," he replied with a nod, "any updates on the Silas situation?"

"Nope. Wherever he is, whoever he is- he's good." Damon acknowledged.

When Stefan only grunted in agreement, Damon continued. "So what was that in there?"

Stefan raised his eyebrows at his brother expectantly.

"Oh, don't give me that. I know you know what I'm talking about- you and Elena and the near kiss. What happened to being over her and moving on?" Damon asked.

Stefan watched him in surprise and his sick feeling grew slightly and he suddenly felt defensive. "I said I was trying to move on. Shockingly, it's not as easy as it sounds." He gave Damon a pointed look, "I thought the guy who chased Katherine for a century and a half might understand that."

Stefan started as Damon let out a peal of laughter beside him. "What?" He questioned.

"It's just that I forget sometimes that although you're supposed to be the _good brother_, that you can be pretty damn selfish."

"What? I was trying to remind Elena of our time together- that was the plan." He reminded his brother.

"What good would reminding her of her time with you do? She left you, remember? Before she shut off her humanity." Damon stated casually.

Stefan glowered at Damon, "why are you so mad at me?" He was getting bored of Damon's unhelpful and irritating comments and wished he'd just say whatever it was he wanted to say.

"Because you're such a liar." Damon turned to stand in front of him, so that they were now face to face.

"What?" Stefan was confused.

"I shouldn't really be surprised; I mean you've been doing it your whole life. You lied to me about Katherine, you lied about agreeing to die human and now you're lying about letting Elena go." Damon said angrily.

"What the hell, Damon? We're back to arguing about Katherine and what happened in 1864?"

"I guess I'm just a little upset that I can't trust you now, just as I couldn't trust you back then with Katerina."

"What did you just say?" Stefan demanded, looking the man before him up and down. He could see it now, he'd done a good job pretending but his words weren't quite right, nor were his facial expressions, even his stance was slightly off. He couldn't believe that he hadn't seen it sooner.

"Silas, I'm assuming." He kept his tone cool- he was not going to let Silas see his fear. Caroline had told him about what the ancient immortal had done to Klaus; he knew that Silas could tear him apart in seconds if he wanted.

"You're clever- not as clever as Niklaus or Katerina perhaps, but certainly cleverer than some of your friends."

Before Stefan could think of what to say or do next, he was being slammed roughly against one of the trees deeper into the forest than he had been standing and Silas allowed him to drop to the floor. He let out a guttural cry of pain as a thick branch of wood was driven through his stomach, pinning him against the tree.

He groaned and stared up at the old vampire, anticipating his next move.

"I'll see you later, Stefan." Silas said softly and began to turn away.

"Wait! Where are you going?" Stefan moaned, he couldn't just let Silas get away; he had to try and keep him distracted, to keep everybody at the dance safe.

"To find out if your brother is as smart as you." He replied tauntingly.

"Stay away from him." Stefan growled, knowing it was useless to threaten the other vampire; he was in absolutely no position to prevent Silas from doing exactly what he wanted.

Silas threw him a faux friendly smile and disappeared. Stefan cursed and began working on removing the branch from what he was almost positive was his small intestine.

He didn't have to wait long before Damon found him and he managed to free himself so that they could save Elena from her, presumably now ex-best friend, and confine her in the basement of their house.

"I wonder if this means that Elena is getting in on our _locking each other in the cellar _thing now, because I thought that was our thing- I liked it." Damon mused once they were upstairs in the living room.

Stefan snorted in reluctant amusement.

"Oh my God," Damon gasped mockingly. "Did I just get a laugh out of my dour little brother? Well this is a momentous occasion."

"You know that I am trying to get over Elena, right?" He asked seriously.

The smile slowly faded from Damon's face, "yes, Stefan, you've made that very clear- repeatedly."

Stefan glanced at him, "you sound mad."

"Keenly observed, Stefan- you're just like Sherlock Holmes." He informed him with heavy sarcasm.

"Are you mad because of tonight?"He continued, ignoring Damon's last comment.

Damon watched his brother in confusion for a long moment, "you're being odd, I'd ask if you were Silas but I think that would be a little repetitive of him."

Stefan didn't say anything, giving Damon time to think about what he'd asked him. "No," he sighed eventually. "I was at first, but I guess that I can understand that it's not easy to just stop loving somebody, even if you want to, even if they've hurt you." Damon coughed awkwardly, embarrassed at having revealed more than he had intended to.

Stefan nodded, clearly understanding.

"I'm guessing your conversation with Silas went something like this?"

"You knew I was lying down there?" Stefan asked in surprise, pointing towards the cellar, where he had implied that Silas had said nothing important to him when Damon asked.

Damon rolled his eyes at his brother's idiocy, "of course I knew you were lying, you lie just like you did when you were five and you were really suck-y at it then too."

"I should have known it was him. He started talking about Katherine, and us getting turned and what I did to you." Stefan confessed, avoiding eye contact with his brother.

"Well, Silas is a manipulative dick. He'll say whatever he thinks will get to you." Damon said in a tone that nobody but Stefan would have recognised as being reassuring.

"I didn't even realise it was him until he called her _Katerina," _he confessed.

"You did better than me- I didn't realise it wasn't you until he stabbed me."

Stefan smiled; he knew that Damon wouldn't have admitted to that unless he was really trying to make Stefan feel better. "Huh, I guess that means that I'm the smart brother." He joked.

"Fine, as long as I get to be the pretty one." Damon smirked, clapping Stefan on the back and letting his hand rest on his shoulder for a moment before getting up to fix himself a drink.

Stefan leaned back on the sofa and turned the TV on, feeling more relaxed than he had since the start of the dance. He was glad when Damon sat down next to him, even when he pulled the remote out of his hand.

"Hey!" Stefan protested half-heartedly, not really minding.

"Oldest chooses what we watch. That's always been the rule."

"In what way has that always been the rule? TVs hadn't even been invented when we were kids."

"So we've got a lot of catching up to do." Damon announced smugly.

**The end.**

**This was for enchanted hybrid, I hope she liked it!**

**I had Silas mention Katherine and the Salvatores turning because if Stefan was feeling guilty about Damon seeing him dance with Elena, I thought he might be feeling guilty about other things as well, which Silas might have picked up on. It's also what most other vampires seem to know about the Salvatores- that they fell in love with the same girl.**

**I found Damon! Silas quite hard to write because he couldn't be totally in character because it was Silas, but at the same time, I wanted him to be fairly in character so that Stefan wouldn't seem like a total idiot for not realising that it was Silas. I don't know why but I found regular Damon really difficult to write as well.**

**I wanted to show Damon as being a bit annoyed about Stefan leaving once Elena gets the cure, because it definitely seems to bother him whenever it's mentioned on the show, but I couldn't really find a place where it felt appropriate to add it in.**

**Please review.**


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